Organized Interest in the Policy-Making Process

Abstract

This chapter explores the provisions within political systems in the CEE countries and how they were designed to stimulate interest groups engagement in the policy process. We start from the processes that influenced the development of institutional structures as they exist today. We continue with evaluating the existing legal and institutional determinants, looking for the provisions for interest inclusion and consultations within agenda setting and policy-making (providing comparative examples from other countries), as well as the external pressure to institutionalize the process of legislative lobbying. We also address the issue of the political environment, making an argument that the characteristics of an interest groups system also have an effect on their inclusion in policy-making. We pay attention here to both: attitudes seen at the micro-level of individual participation in interest groups, but also the macro-level patterns of political competition, where structural political factors affect organized interest groups.